Alleged intellectual property theft is just the US’s excuse to impose a raft of tariffs on China, said Chen Jiahe, chief strategist at Cinda Securities.

The Trump administration raised the stakes in a growing trade showdown with China, targeting 25 percent tariffs on about 1,300 industrial technology, transport and medical products to try to force changes in alleged intellectual property practices.

But Chen said that “technology theft” is just an excuse as the technology property is actually under contracts.

“US agreed to sell technology to Chinese companies in the past, and we give them money and market shares, so they were all agreed in the past. So I think that just one reason to start a fight,” said Chen.

Trump administration pushed ahead tariffs plans because of the large trade deficit, according to Chen, but China does not want to escalate trade dispute.

“You have to consider that China has not much things to do with the trade surplus recently. Why do we need such much money?” said Chen, “We get US dollars, and we invest them in the US treasury, then get two to three percent return per year. So we are not getting too much from US either.”

Global supply chains, overseas investments, FTAs China has voiced opposition against the proposed US tariffs in a strong tone. China's tax administration has unveiled a new list of targeted American goods on Wednesday. China will raise tariffs 25 percent on 106 products, covering 14 areas.

Some analysts concerned the trade dispute will affect Chinese firms, but Chen suggests investors to look at the positive side.

“Chinese stock market is offering 0.8 times P/B Ratio again, one of the lowest in the history, it caused by this kind of trade wars. It gives you good opportunity to buy,” Chen added.

The Trump Administration wants to reduce the trade deficit in goods between the USA and China by exporting more US-made goods. They want China to allow US firms tariff free access to the Chinese market. And they want China to abandon its State-led industrial policy which has succeeded in developing its own national industries.

In other words, Trump wants to have his cake and eat it too.

It’s clear that the USA is looking at using China as a scapegoat for its own economic malaise which is caused by almost four decades of neoliberal Capitalist policies which has succeeded in hallowing out its manufacturing industries. However, it’s worth noting that these “outsourcing” practices were adopted by US corporations long before China joined the WTO in 2001. That China became the single largest source of the trade deficit between the USA and the rest of the world is an incidental matter, arising from US corporations outsourcing the manufacturing of their consumer products to Chinese factories.

China didn’t force US corporations to outsource their manufacturing to Chinese factories. Steve Bannon recently commented that he supports the Trump Administration in imposing tariffs on Chinese imports because Wall Street doesn’t care about the white working classes in the industrial belt in the US Midwest. So this unilateral act is a way for Trump to prove to his political base that he cares about their plight. But Trump is barking at the wrong tree because Wall Street — not China — is the primary instigator and main beneficiary of the wholesale “outsourcing” of manufacturing industries that has decimated the industrial heartland of the USA. And that’s why the white working classes who lived there voted for Trump.

So ultimately these Chinese tariffs are in fact a political issue between the Trump Administration and Wall Street: it’s all about the nationalists vs the globalists. As Steve Bannon puts it: “To hell with Wall Street!”

Technology theft or intellectual property theft is part and parcel to the workplace in the US.
Every employee has to sign an agreement before they will be hired that states that any
ideas, devices, technology, or so forth (in legal mumbo jumbo) will automatically belong
to the company.
This discourages creativity and increases employee's feelings of hopelessness and employee turn over rates.
The US practices intellectual property theft on a grand scale so they have no right to complain about others in the world, whether it really exists or not.

If capitalism promotes innovation and creativity then why aren't scientists and artists the richest people in a capitalist nation?